Alt soul band The Grey Area has one of those origin stories that you only hear from critical darling British rock groups. The group’s members 3rty and Kid Marley were  both making music as solo artists before a chance meeting at the third installment of Lagos based alternative music meet up Cave Wave where they were both billed to perform. They heard each other perform, exchanged numbers and  initially facilitated by Cave Wave’s organizer Amanda Iheme, began the slow process of morphing their individual sounds into a new and interesting whole. Two years later (they first met in 2015) they’re a bonafide supergroup that found that sweet pop between Naija pop, jazz, soul and indie folk.

They’re not slowing down either, together they’ve recorded an album they’re calling The Grey Area, produced in the UK by Tom Misch. The Grey Area is fusion of their sounds and interests and the debut single off the new project “Sunday Morning” makes us excited as fuck. We’re not quite sure if the song’s title references Maroon 5’s interpretation of a Sunday Morning gone wrong, but it certainly has its own urgency and fervor. The guitar work will remind indie instrumental band enthusiasts of legends Explosions in the sky, with the crisp notes and minor melodies. But the song’s clap samples and drum sequence adds a pop airiness that is definitely more Bruno Mars than Coldplay. On such delightful scaffolding 3rty and Kid Marley soar, bringing the best of their discordant but decidedly Nigerian styles to play, telling stories of existentialism, millennial angst and hope that springs eternal.

The Grey Area will definitely be an Opus and put the group in a category all their own, redefining what we’ve come to know as Indie Pop. And they more than deserve it, “Sunday Morning” is a fantastic debut.

Listen to “Sunday Morning” here.